Another Life: Return of the Fallen
by Never-Rebel
Summary: Pan, after fleeing to space, has become entangled in the remnants of Freeza's army. Piccolo has gone in search of her, but does she want to be found? And the most pressing question... who was left to take charge?
1. The Search Begins

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Disclaimer: _Dragon Ball_ and _Dragon Ball Z _are © Akira Toriyama-sama, _Dragon Ball GT _is the property of some idiot… I do not own any of the Dragon Ball series, nor am I making a profit off of this.

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Title: Another Life: Return of the Fallen

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Chapter One: The Search Begins

* * *

A plastic mask covered her mouth and nose, feeding her oxygen. Pan tongued the object, trying to move it away, but it had been strapped around her head and refused to budge. She was laid out on a firm bed, her lower back sore from having been there too long. She stretched, her wrists tugging against a cold, solid something: restraints. Shackles had also been secured around her ankles. She tugged against them, oddly weak, her mind hazy and spinning.

Pan squinted her eyes, noticing several other blurry, plain beds lined up along the drab gray walls. All of them were empty. A tray of bottles filled with clear liquids and syringes sat next to her bed. Pan recognized that she was in a hospital, clinic, whatever it was called on the ship and she had a nasty feeling that she had been drugged. 

Dumu came to her bedside, his haggard blue face frowning and carrot-colored moustache dangling over her as he looked her over.

"Hello, Miz Pan. It'z so nice to see you awake." His smile was hidden under his thick facial hair. 

He pulled open her eyelids as if he wanted the ball to fall right out, peering into them; they were dry when he released her lids. There was a black box attached the side of the bed that he wandered over to, wrinkled his face at, then looked at Pan. 

She glared at him - all three of him.

"You collapsed earlier."

__

No shit, you idiot.

"I don't like to tell you thiz, but you've contracted a viruz, miz. You've had it for quite some time… anyhow, it'z known az _dezteria_, rather uncommon to my people," he paused. "It effectz the arteriez, sometimez the lungz, and requirez a simple operation to repair the damage itz already done to you."

Desteria? Dumu picked up a needle from the tray and flicked it twice. _You aren't sticking that in me!_ Pan tried to talk, but it came out in mumbles and groans. Damn, how weak _was_ she?

He wiped her arm with a wet cloth and she squirmed, wincing as he stuck the needle in her arm, emptied the contents into her bloodstream and then retracted it. 

__

"Something to relax you so that I can work on you," he explained.

He hated her, he wanted to kill her; she didn't want him messing with her insides!

The drug began to take effect after a while. Pan fought against the stimulant and swiped at Dumu's clothes, but he had distanced himself. Damn coward. She dropped her hands, lolled her head back and fell asleep. 

Dumu grabbed one of his surgical utensils, pulled her shirt up and began the procedure. 

--

"Please let me go with you, Piccolo."

"No," he growled, "I'm going alone."

There were tears in her eyes. What did she expect? His pity?

"But she's my daughter!" Videl cried.

Pan was her daughter, but Videl couldn't help. She wasn't over Gohan's death. And honestly he wasn't over it either, but he didn't have a barrage of human emotions bogging him down. He could cope with this - Videl could not.

"Videl," Bulma said gently, "it's only a one man ship anyway. If you want, you can stay here at Capsule Corp. You can talk to Piccolo any time you want."

She led Videl to a table that had been pushed up against the wall, cluttered with various tools and an empty toolbox. Bulma handed her an organic-shaped black box; she lifted up the middle part, showing her a small screen. Videl saw her reflection on the screen and wiped her cheeks dry.

"See? It's a vidphone," Bulma said softly.

Videl nodded and set the item back down. She looked at Piccolo, reining control of her emotions and hardening her features.

"Please find her, Piccolo," she said.

The sentiment in her voice made him uncomfortable. He looked at her, trying to say something, but his mind was empty. He stepped onto the platform, which had been modeled after the old Namek spacecraft, said, "Up" (rather than the former password "Piccolo") and was lifted inside. There was a plexiglass encasement around the platform entrance with a sliding half-door. Bulma had wasted time putting it up, Piccolo thought, as he threw it open and moved into the pilots seat, bent down towards the controls as Bulma had taught him to do, and said, "Blast off". He didn't like that woman's choice of verbal commands to operate the computerized ship, but there was no one to hear him.

There were no dragonballs on the planet anymore; they had disappeared along with, or rather _into_, Goku. There was no way to wish Gohan back. No way of wishing Pan back to Earth. If he had not been such good friends with Gohan he wouldn't have even considered chasing after the damn brat. And if not for Vegeta - who knew what was going on in his head then - who had just let her get on the spaceship and leave, Piccolo wouldn't even have to do this.

Dumu was on that ship with Pan, a man who had gleefully pointed her out as a thief for taking a dragon ball and wanted her executed for it. He knew Dumu was with her simply because after they had buried the dead bodies and gathered up the survivors he hadn't been amongst them. The ones still alive were being hoarded at Capsule Corp., in some ingenious prison that Bulma had whipped up. As far as Piccolo knew they were going to be sent to some primitive planet in another galaxy so it would be many years before they could ever return to Earth. If they ever wanted to after that time.

Piccolo got up to meditate in an open space, which there wasn't much of in the tiny ship.

__

"She'll be back within two weeks", Vegeta had said. Not surprisingly, he was wrong, and Piccolo was sure that he had meant to be. They both knew Pan wasn't going to come back. Call it intuition. That and he couldn't feel her ki; she was too far away. If she hadn't already been killed by Dumu. 

He closed his eyes and prepared himself for a very long trip. 

--

Pan's hands were wet and she wiped them on her pants, noting that the scaredy-cat had unlocked her cuffs. There were rusty smears on her pants, crusted and old. It was her father's blood. The thought of how it got there wouldn't budge from her mind. Her mental eye had the image of her bloody father well preserved, forcing her to see the ki-carved hole in his chest. When she couldn't make the image go away she got frustrated; she had to do something, hit someone, pull her hair, _something_! This was going to make her go mad.

But, she restrained her odd urges. She put her hands under her top, feeling over her stomach for any signs that Dumu had permanently or fatally harmed her. There was a long line of raised flesh barely felt; Pan had expected heavy stitches and a hideous scar that would make her old battle wounds look like beauty marks. She sat up painfully, the black box beeping at her. She smacked it. It broke off, fell to the ground, sparked once and died. 

The pain in her abdomen made her feel like her skin was going to rip open. She tolerated it, hopped onto the cold floor and padded through the doorless archway. 

Pan didn't know the ship well since she only visited the control room and the cafeteria, but she knew how to find her way around. The ship was oval-shaped and the outer wing went in a complete circle, separated by a main hallway that led to the helm at the center of the ship. Pan traipsed through the outer corridor, stopping at closed doors, punching at random buttons to see if they would open for her to investigate and, when none opened for her, continued. She found the main hall, went into it and frowned because the door was shut. The square of buttons on the side was completely alien to her and she didn't know the code, so she knocked on the door, figuring that Dumu couldn't stay in there forever if he didn't want her. The door _shlinked_ open.

"You should be resting, miz Pan."

"Probably," she shrugged. 

She walked up to the visual screens, staring hard at the center one. There was a map brought up on it, some of the locations named, a few lines indicating safe traveling routes.

"Where we goin'?" she asked, her eyes flitting from one dot to the next.

Dumu pointed to one of the smaller, brilliant dots, "Here. Travlaka."

There was an incessant chirping noise coming from one the consoles. She complained, but Dumu shook his head and told her that there was nothing he could do about it.

"That sound meanz that the enginez need a fresh power supply relatively soon. That'z why we are going to Travlaka," he said.

"And where to after Trav-a-lo-co?" 

"Trav-lock-uh," Dumu enunciated.

"Whatever," she said. 

"And I do not know where we're going. You haven't given me a deztination yet."

Pan questioned his mental state of mind, sometimes. He was actually going to take her all through space until she picked out a place to go, and she didn't even know where she wanted to go. Some place habitable, maybe. With food. And people to fight.

--

His mind was clear, focused, groping for the familiar ki of Son Pan. The brat had a three week head start, could have gone in any direction. There was no sure way of knowing that he had chosen the right direction to pursue. Even a breadth off of the exact path and he would be horrendously off course in a month. Then what? Would she even be close enough then for him to track? Piccolo knew what he had to do, knew he wasn't going about it in the most intelligent way, but it was how it had to be done. 

If he didn't have a sense of her ki after two weeks - how much faster did their ship go? or was his faster? -he would change the itinerary and go a different way. 

--

It was a day and a half before Travlaka appeared on the screen as a moon-sized mass rather than an effulgent star. Pan, who had fallen asleep on the floor propped against the wall, got up stiffly. Something on the front screen moved, like the light of a plane in the night sky. Another spec showed up, sailing across the darkness of space. More of them become noticeable, heading towards the planet, from the planet, so far away from it yet making the planet seem so alive. Pan was awestruck - she had never imagined such a busy world.

The planet was a myriad of whites, grays and browns from afar; up close, air vehicles of all colors coasted through the skies. It looked like rush hour. There were no clouds and Pan got the impression that the climate was rather cold; the sun was so much further away than what she had become accustomed to on Earth. That was a place she didn't want to go back to for reasons that seemed so trivial, but now that she had already vowed not to return - she wouldn't. No matter how homesick she was. 

Dumu brought their ship to the darker, far side of the surface where the sun was beginning to set; there was no spectacular display of colors. Gravity grabbed hold of their ship, bouncing it around as if it was a plastic toy train that made this fascinating rattling noise when shaken. Pan held onto the seat as their craft quaked; was shrewdly thrown out of the chair and onto her knees. Her right breast hit the edge of the seat on her way down. She grumbled a curse, holding her tender breast. Then the savage tottering ceased and, panting, Pan climbed back into her seat. 

She looked at the wall-screens and the many views of the world that they offered. Large, triangular platforms reached well into the sky, each on various levels and spread out in an orderly fashion. They looked like oddly-shaped building tops, painted with bright orange lines, probably there to guide the pilot for landing. Pan peered down further: a tube ran through each platform support, connecting them to each other. They all led to same, big, web-like white building. 

Dumu handled the thrusters and landing gear skillfully, fiddling with both at the same time. The landing he made was smooth, which Pan suspected was no amazing fete since the ship didn't really land - it just floated inches off the ground. The technology must have been similar to the technology Capsule Corp. used to make airbikes move and hover. 

The only thing that she had remembered and knew how to use was the ramp release switch: push down, pull down and bring down. Simple. 

Pan stumbled down the rampway, hopped off at the bottom and looked to Dumu for guidance. She would have to rely on him to lead her around this bizarre continent. He led her to an open-faced elevator on the platform, which took them down to the mid-level tubing. When he noticed her bewildered expression, he explained that he had been here a few times before. 

"It's busy," Pan commented.

"Yez, izn't is wonderful? Buzy, loud, and so unfriendly in certain placez," he said cheerily.

She gave him a funny look.

As they walked down the wide corridor several alien beings were also slipping into the hall in front or behind them. There was a pair some ways in front of them of tall, furry creatures, tailless and without clothes. They were shaggy and both of them chunky. Pan stared inconspicuously. She would have to get used to the many different races and their appearances. 

One critter, who was heading back to his ship, eyed Pan repulsively. He was a pink-scaled, squat creature with overly large, floppy ears, and a flat nose that all came together for a mean face. Pan glared at him in passing and he snapped his teeth at her knees. She kicked him reflexively back into the wall where it fractured the cement-like material. He slipped down onto the floor. Dumu grabbed her by the shoulders and steered her forward.

"Hey, get off me! Jeez! What's your problem?"

Dumu wagged a finger at her. "Do not go getting into fightz," he said, "There are people here who would kill you for doing something like that."

"Whatever."

__

Do they kill like your people do? she was tempted to ask; the way they had used her absorbed ki to murder Papa.Or did each race have their own special weapons and kill in their own ways?

--

Piccolo's ship tottered violently. He stumbled backward into the pilot's chair, furious that he couldn't remember the damn word to get a shield up around the ship. He leapt from his seat and to the cabinet of capsules; he did remember which one he needed. He snatched it, clicked it open; an orange space suit _bomphed_ out from the smoke. The ship convulsed again, sliding it into the wall. 

Forcefield. Forcefield was the word!

He moved hastily back to the computer, growled the word at it and the ship immediately buzzed and erected the invisible armor. The assaulting spaceship was closing in; it was a small vessel, but still larger than his. One that wanted to blow him to smithereens just because it thought it could. And, since he had been in such a hurry to leave, he had told Bulma that the ship wouldn't need weapons because he could defend it himself. 

He hadn't expected _this_.

The structure wobbled faintly as another blast was fired, but the forcefield absorbed the brunt of it. Though, for how long it would hold he didn't know. Piccolo went back to the suit and threw off his cape, picked up the top half and squeezed it over his shoulders. The bottom half wouldn't fit him so he left it be, grabbed the clear helmet and attached it to the suit. It rubbed against his antenna, but he didn't have time to deal with that. He swept into the lucid chamber and sealed the door, now understanding why it was there. 

"Open!" he yelled at the computer. It obeyed. 

He was yanked down and out by the vacuum of space, veered away into the nothingness and fired a ki blast at the enemy vessel. It burst around an unseen shield. Piccolo moved closer to it and fired another, stronger blast - the shield wavered and faded. The next shot hit the firing weapons at the top of the ship and reacted violently with his ki; the entire top exploded. He ducked under a chunk of scrap metal and flew backwards, back toward his ship. Random parts were sucked out from within, mostly alien contraptions and loose parts. Along with the alien technology, three aliens were ripped out of the tremendous hole, each quickly pulling away. 

Out of the immediate suction, they righted themselves and hovered in the limitless void, glowering at Piccolo. They were wearing distinct, white-plated armor that was very familiar to him: Saiyajin armor. The armor had been altered slightly, but the dark suits underneath made him certain. They also wore scouters.

"You're trespassing in Lord Frieza's quadrant, freak," one man said.

"Frieza's been dead for years," Piccolo informed them flatly.

"Quite right," another said. 

Perplexed, he cursed as they came at him. He shot a widespread hail of ki balls at the troop, hitting a tiny, peachy alien face-on. The goblin-like being was hurled into his ship, leaving a body indentation on its hull. The others rolled out of the way and threw their own ki blasts at him. Piccolo swatted them away, eying the ship behind them. He winked out of sight, phased in a distance behind them; they halted, confused until their scouters pointed them around. Piccolo crouched, feigning an attack stance; he waited for them to get close enough and then _zanokened_ to his original location. He fired a thick ki beam at the body of ship. Pieces of heavy metal erupted, breaking apart and smashing into the aliens. They were knocked unconscious and carried away with the debris. 

Piccolo went back to his spacecraft, growling "up" at the platform to lift him back in. He pulled off his helmet, dropped it on the ground; the upper space suit caused quite a problem, but after some amount of struggling he tugged it off without ripping it and dropped that too. 

"Drop forcefield," he said. The computer complied.

Some of the smaller bits of wreckage hit the ship, mostly metal that had been disintegrated into little more than particles of matter. Piccolo sat down at the helm, pondering the men and the Saiyajin armor. They weren't Saiyajin. Not a chance. It was the same outfit that Radditz had shown up in, the same color garments Vegeta and Nappa had arrived in, the same armor design Frieza had worn on Old Namek. 

They were Frieza's henchmen, some of them anyway. Of course he and the others hadn't thought that his army had only consisted of a shipful of men, had they? The tyrant's empire had crumbled with his death, though. All of his predecessors and elites had been killed years ago. Had enough of his army survived that they remained in control of this particular quadrant? No, without a leader it wouldn't have survived. It was possible that those men had been and were still loyal to Frieza. How foolish.

Piccolo instructed the ship's computer to continue on the set course. 

* * *

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A/N – Yes I did have this story posted before, but when I tried to read it, well… I realized there wasn't much of a grab at the beginning. So I switched some of the wording around (lo and behold it all still works) and hopefully made it look a little better. Enjoy!

Indeed this is the sequel to Determination, however it isn't necessary to read that unless you want a full explanation of how she got into space, really. That story might be taken down in the future and reworked since I am not excessively proud of it. However, _this_ story has started out on the good foot. ^_^ 

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Thank You - To Steven P. P (hee hee, P. P. Err, sorry) for beta-reading this chapter. I wouldn't mind having more beta-readers for the story... ;) *hint hint*

Planned Update – 4/25

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Quote That Amuses The Author -_"Damn, the fat one's dead!" _- Vegeta, watching the Majin/Good Buu fight


	2. The Pursuer to the Pursued

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Title: Another Life: Return of the Fallen

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Chapter Two: The Pursuer Becomes the Pursued

* * *

Before, Videl had stayed in the guestroom to mope, but now she was restless. She wandered the halls of Capsule Corp., passing by Bulma's lab each time; the vidphone had been moved into there. And she was curious, even if it had only been two days. She hesitated, knocked on the door then went in. Bulma glanced at her then refocused on the computer.

On the screen there was a lined diagram of Piccolo's ship. Videl could see that a large piece in the front was red and blinking. Bulma snatched out a trail of paper from the printer and scanned them over, her face going sour.

"There's something wrong with the ship," she said.

"What?"

"Piccolo's going to lose this entire side," she gestured to the monitor, "if it doesn't get fixed."

Bulma grabbed the vidphone, plugged it into a larger screen and punched the button. Piccolo's face appeared on the screen moments later.

"What happened to the ship?" Bulma demanded.

Piccolo explained what had happened, leaving out specific details about the men who had attacked him – like the fact that they had Saiyajin armor and scouters.

"Well you need to fix that thing, buster. Go get the toolbox, it's in one of the capsules," she ordered, "I'll take you through this step-by-step," Bulma said, much calmer.

"Wait," Videl said quickly. Once they began working, she wouldn't get a chance to ask. "Have you… is there any sign of Pan?"

Piccolo shook his head. "I can't feel her, she's too far away." Then, as an afterthought: "She might also be suppressing her ki."

"Why didn't you say anything about that before?" Bulma asked incredulously. "I might be able to come up with something!" She paused thoughtfully, already working out the plans in her head. "But first we need to fix the ship before it falls apart." 

~~~

Dumu had left her alone in a roomful of aliens, roaring with talk and laughter. She caught glimpses of his orange hair in the crowd, talking to others about trading for whatever their spaceship needed. Pan had isolated herself by the wall. She felt small, alone; there was no one in the room that looked even remotely human.

One of the aliens was staring at her, probably at her bloody pants. She glared at it – what was its problem? The creature stood and came over, its three-toed feet stopping next to her. Its was hay-colored and, if she looked closely, she could see the cracks in its dry skin; its outfit was a simple, rich green bathing suit. Though, Pan didn't think they knew what a bathing suit was out here. 

It spoke to her in an alien language, brought its hand to its round beak and made a gesture that she didn't understand. A pink monocle covered one of its orange eyes. It was odd that only one had a vision problem – or maybe it was colorblind. The glass _was_ pink. There was also a collar around its neck.

"I don't understand you," Pan said, hoping her facial expression and body language would convey her message. 

"You speak Icejin?" it asked. It sounded male.

Pan was puzzled. 

"I've never heard of… Icejin."

"That. You're speaking it," he said.

"Oh." 

"I'm Totan," he said. 

He sat down in front of her, curling his tail around his waist twice - that thing had to be the length of his body. Totan stared at her, waiting for her introduction. If she really wanted to begin a new life, she could make up a new name. No one here, with the exception of Dumu, would ever know her lie. Pan's mind rapidly thought over it. She didn't even have to be human out here – she could say she was Saiyajin. Totan was still staring at her expectantly. Damn! What could she call herself? What was that name Vegeta had called Grandpa G? His Saiyajin name. Kaka…

"Kakaraddo." 

Pan mentally cringed. That didn't sound like the right name. 

"Just call me Kaka," she amended. At least _that_ part was right, but it still didn't sound good.

"Kaka," he nodded, "you're very powerful."

Pan wondered if she should tell him that he felt only a portion of her actual power. She felt his ki, which wasn't even above an average human's; that was pathetic. 

"My lord is looking for men like you. Strong," Totan said.

"I'm a woman," Pan snapped.

He smiled apologetically and said, "I meant it in the figurative sense." He paused. "Are you looking for work?"

Until he mentioned it, she hadn't even considered a job.

"I guess," she shrugged. "It depends, really."

He rattled off a list of jobs that didn't interest her, then gave her a thin-lipped smile. 

"You could be trained for battle, if that sort of thing appeals to you," he said, eyeing her pants. 

That caught her attention. 

"What kind of 'battle'? Joining the army kind of stuff?" she asked. 

"Come with me. I believe my lord could explain things much better than I." Then added: "If you're interested, of course."

When Totan mentioned 'lord', she suspected that meant boss. Pan was interested, but she also didn't want to leave with a stranger. If things didn't work out, then what would she be left with? She'd be stranded. But he had mentioned battle, which made her think of army or military-type training, and space travel. That was what she had wanted. 

"If I go with you, but I don't like it…" Pan trailed off. She didn't know how to finish the sentence.

"I'm sure we could bring you back here, or wherever it is you would like to go."

Pan thought more about it. After all, she did want to get away from Dumu and here was her chance. Get out on her own, with a new life and identity, do what she wanted.

Finally, she nodded.

~~~

"There. We're done," Bulma sighed.

The volume on the vidscreen had been upped to maximum so that he could hear her instructions and, after four hours of being screamed at for not being tool savvy, Piccolo was finished. There had been no way to replace the actual plating, but he did learn how to weld using a finger beam. Then all he had to do was replace the melted bolts and tighten the loosened ones. He was now very practiced with a wrench, since his fingers had been too big for the job.

__

Don't sound too exhausted, woman, I'm the one who that did all the work.

Piccolo reentered the ship, wrestled to get his suit off and then went to the screen. Bulma snickered at him.

"It's your fault it's too small," he said.

"I'm sorry, Piccolo. I'm going to get to work on that ki-detecting device. 'Ki detector', sounds like a good name for it, don't you think?" she asked.

He didn't care as long as it would work.

"How soon can you have it made?" he demanded.

"I don't know. Something like this isn't gonna be easy, you know," she said. "I-"

Something made him suddenly alert, sharper. A multitude of ki's approaching, too close together for him to distinguish much. Were they looking for him? He seriously suspected they were. When he blew up that ship, he hadn't considered any repercussions. He had dismissed the notion that there was some enormous empire leftover from Frieza's reign, but it was foolish to think that no more than three people had been excessively loyal. Piccolo had to be cautious. The ship wouldn't be able to withstand another attack and he wasn't going to take the chance, especially since it could be more than one vessel. If they were searching for him then he was going to have to hide.

"I have to go," he said quickly and switched off the screen. He had cut Bulma off, which would no doubt make her angry with him, but she would get over it. 

He got the distinct impression that this was not one of the friendlier territories in the universe. Piccolo dampened his ki to a ridiculously low level and barked new coordinates to the computer. There wasn't a planet nearby, so he would have to get as far away as he could in another direction. 

The ship thrusters propelled it forward, moving onto its new course. Piccolo folded his arms, scowling at the screen. What he was doing to get that damn brat back was unbelievable…

Roughly a day later, Piccolo estimated, he knew they were following him. No matter how low his ki became or which way he went, they somehow stayed right with him. He was at a loss because he, even with his miniscule understanding of machines, knew that he couldn't outrun another ship. It hadn't been built for that.

There were three ships, he determined, but he couldn't figure out how many were actually onboard each. It felt like a lot. Piccolo searched through the cabinet of capsules Bulma had packed: water, fuel, spare parts - nothing that would help him. He couldn't outrun them any longer; he would have to fight if he didn't want to risk them blowing up his ship. So he put on the orange suit top again, secured the helmet and oxygen pack and floated out to greet his pursuers. 

Several men came out of the ships; only two of them wore helmets. Piccolo didn't know how it was possible to breathe in space – there was no air - but they did. Maybe it came naturally for some species, or maybe there was some kind of technique that allowed someone to breathe in space. Or maybe they could just hold their breath for a really long time. Piccolo couldn't believe he was trying to figure it out and stopped trying to logic it. There was one thing he wanted to know, though:

"How did you follow me?"

The man in front floated closer – Piccolo assumed he was the one in charge.

"Your ship left a nice trail for us to follow," he said.

Damn. The ship! Fuel, smoke; he supposed that stuff was traceable. 

"So," the man said as he fiddled with his scouter, "you're Namek."

He recalled Radditz's scouter: it could read power levels and be used as a communicator. It could not determine the race of a being. The device must have been modified over the years.

Piccolo said nothing.

"Well, _Namek_, either come with us willingly or we are going to hurt you," he said.

As long as he didn't blow up the ship…

"I'm not that willing," Piccolo said, slipping into a fighting stance.

"Very well."

The man in charge raised his fist into the air and waved out another group of men, each of various shape and origin. The majority of them, including the leader, were small yet built and well defined. They moved into practiced formation and Piccolo knew he was outmatched; there was too many. The first wave of troops came blazing with rapid-fire discharges; the others began forming a circle around him. Piccolo skimmed away from a blast that was much too close to his ear, working out possible escape routes. He knew they were surrounding him, he could feel it in his antenna. 

Some pulled out spherical, handled weapons from the hooks installed on their armor and aimed; others raised their palms and began collecting energy. Piccolo dodged under another blast and shot downward. His best chance was to outrun them. They fired their weird guns, following him with a bright stream of… what? Electricity? He phased out of sight, reappeared and tried to jet through a gap in the perimeter of bodies. Stupid idea, he realized. The alien closest didn't hesitate to shoot. Piccolo's body convulsed ferinely and eventually he slipped out of consciousness, his gi smoldering. 

The leader drifted toward him and nudged his arm. No movement. 

"Guess the Namek couldn't handle the charge," he scoffed. "Get him up onto the ship. I want him in containment before he wakes up."

"Yes sir, Bénán!" The troop bowed, fisting a hand over his breast. 

When Piccolo awoke he couldn't see; the darkness was too complete for his eyes to adjust to. He was on solid ground, so they hadn't left him in space to freeze or suffocate. He rolled over tentatively and found a sliver of light at the ground that outlined the base of a door. Piccolo stood and hit his head on the ceiling. He cursed, tilted his head uncomfortably and fired a bolt of ki at the door. It ricocheted back and he ducked reflexively. It bounced off the ceiling, into the back wall and struck him in the back. He threw his shoulders back and hissed. Great, he had been taken prisoner _and_ the room was blast-proof. 

Piccolo sat down to meditate. He extended his senses, touching on the ki's of the crew. One of them was headed his way and, when the door parted, he didn't move. 

The man, who he recognized as the head honcho from earlier, demanded that Piccolo stand. His mind sifted rapidly through all the possibilities of escape: he could easily knock this man out of the way, but where would he go? He didn't know how to get off the ship. They would capture him before he ever found an exit. He could blast a hole through the hull plating, get sucked out and make a dash for his ship. No, they had probably left it behind and he would never be able find his way back to. How long had he been out for anyway? 

"If you do something stupid, I will kill you, understood?" he asked.

Piccolo looked hard at him, then nodded. He was instructed to walk, one of those odd-shaped guns pressed into the swell of his back, jabbing him constantly and directing him into a lit, empty room. There was a large screen set up on the far wall that he recognized. The man pushed him onto a platform in the center of the room and pressed in a code on the control panel. After a few moments, the screen flickered and a black, furry face appeared on the screen. 

"What is it?" the beast growled, his flat nose wrinkling.

"I want a containment cell prepared by the time I arrive for my prisoner," he answered.

"And how does this concern _me_, Bénán?" He bared his yellowed canines.

"I need a meeting arranged with the lord, _Shoruum_," he said, then pointed at Piccolo, "he's from Namek."

Piccolo glanced at him, but didn't correct his assumption.

"Does he know anything?" Shoruum asked.

"He isn't talking," he lied quickly. Bénán looked at Piccolo, daring him to say otherwise. 

"Try asking again. When Lord Rhoune returns, I'll let you know if you can have your meeting."

Lord Rhoune?

"Bénán," he continued, "do not kill him." 

Shoruum reverted briefly into another language; Bénán understood it and nodded. He put a fist to his chest and closed out the link.

"What did you need me for?" Piccolo asked, irritated. Now that he knew the orders were to keep him alive he could afford to be a bit insubordinate, but he wouldn't push it too far.

"Proof," Bénán replied. "Because you aren't supposed to be alive. How did you survive anyway, Namek?" he asked.

"I'm not talking."

Bénán backhanded him with the gun, "Smart ass."

~~~

Since Videl had a little knowledge of ki-tracking, Bulma had asked her to stay. She had been asked so many questions that were frustrating to answer that she had said no more - doing it was so much easier than explaining. Bulma had left in search of her husband, who would have a better understanding of it. 

Videl was about to leave the lab and return to her room to mope when the large screen began to fizzle with static. A scratchy picture appeared on it, too disjointed to make out anything. She fiddled with the connection cord, which did no good – the ship was getting too far away to get a good signal from. She hit the vidphone with the heel of her hand and the picture cleared for a moment. It wasn't Piccolo there. And there certainly wasn't two of him. Videl hit it again and the image remained somewhat perceptible. Two bald, brown things were arguing with each other. One had lapsed into a foreign language, the other spoke in a rough-sounding English. 

"You could've killed us! What if that had been a self-destruct button?"

The other alien yelled at him and glanced at the screen. Its eyes went wide then it pointed at Videl. She backed away from the screen, her mouth partially open in uncertainty. 

"Turn it off!" one said.

They scrambled to turn it off, but couldn't find the right button on the board. Videl panicked, grabbed the cord and ripped it out of the socket. She slammed the vidphone closed and shut it off. For a long while, she stared at the contraption wide-eyed and breathing heavily. Then she ran out of the lab. 

* * *

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A/N – This chapter was taken down so that a few minor details could be changed after a healthy discussion with my beta reader. 

So that no one gets confused – Pan will be referred to as "Kaka" in dialogue only. In regular paragraphs, she's just "Pan"… because that's less confusing. ^_^

My beta-reader, Steven, pointed out a nifty little thing to me: "English" doesn't seem to exist in the Dragon Ball world. Or rather, it's never mentioned. No name was given to the language – it's just spoken. :P So, forgive me for actually specifically naming it as English. And also a big thanks to him for beta-reading this chapter! 

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Planned Update – 5/4

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Quote That Amuses The Author - "You can stay in my body until the fight with Frieza's over. After that, I'm charging rent." – Piccolo (I was looking at a nice, long quotes list. I'm easily amused)


	3. Lord Rhoune

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Title: Another Life: Return of the Fallen

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Chapter **Three**: Lord Rhoune

* * *

After hearing Videl's panicked story Bulma stormed back to the lab, Vegeta following curiously. She chattered to herself on the way about how she had rigged the vidphone monitor to store calls for three days – since she didn't live and sleep in that room. They entered swiftly, her face etched with seriousness as she stalked to the screen; Videl plugged it back into the outlet. Bulma worked with the controls a moment and the image suddenly rewound, stopped and began to play from the beginning. She and Vegeta both recognized the Saiyajin armor they wore, and the scouters. 

"Maybe Piccolo just had a few visitors, you know," Videl said, her voice quavering. 

"It's obvious that his ship was captured," Vegeta sneered, "and those idiots would have killed themselves if anyone else had built it."

"Hey! I would like to see you do better on such short notice," Bulma said, "but since you think you're all-knowing, why are they wearing that armor, huh?"

"Probably found it in a dump. That armor is an old model. I can see why they would want it, though," he smirked.

"Oh get over yourself! I'm going to try contacting the ship. I'm sure Piccolo could have taken care of those guys," she said, then added, "Right?"

Videl nodded, more to convince herself. Vegeta said nothing.

The vidphone on Piccolo's ship was uncooperative – it wouldn't even respond. Which meant that they must have completely shut down the ship, Bulma concluded. They waited in case it would suddenly buzz and turn on, but it didn't. Vegeta left and returned a few minutes later.

"You're wasting your time," he said. "If they don't kill him then they're going to keep him prisoner."

  
"What? What are you talking about?" Bulma asked.

"You might not have any clue as to what happened out there, but I know how it works, woman. And just because the Namek is powerful doesn't mean he can't be caught. So, you can just sit here on your ass while he gets himself killed-"

  
"Or what? Build another ship and go after him? I don't think so! Firstly, _you're_ the only one that seems to think he's been captured by evil aliens. And secondly, I'm not stupid enough to go into space alone.

"If you give me some time, I might be able to build that ki-detector. Once I figure out exactly how you can… feel it, or whatever it is you do, I can start designing, then building. We could try to find Piccolo with that. _But_ we probably won't have to because he'll have told us that he's fine and _not_ captured by then," she huffed.

Vegeta snorted.

"I hope it can find dead bodies, too."

"Oh? Well if you're so worried about him then why don't you go after him?" Bulma spat, her face pink with anger.

"I intend to," hr said.

"Really…" she said, her voice back to normal, "and just how are you doing to do that?"

Vegeta dug into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a capsule, pinching it between his thumb and forefinger.

"So you're going to fly around in space on a capsule…"

"Come with me, woman," he growled.

Vegeta led Bulma and Videl, who had tagged along, outside. He found an expanse of open grass on the Capsule Corp. grounds, clicked the button on the capsule and tossed it out far in front of them. A ship appeared, not much bigger than the Namek-based one built for Piccolo. It was a drab white and the darkening sky kept the solid coloring from hurting their eyes.

"Where did you get that?" Bulma asked, wide-eyed.

"I built it," he said. "What? Did you think all I did with my time was train?"

"Well yeah… but how?" she asked.

"Your father and I started working on the plans for this thing a while ago now. I started building it about eight years ago. And it didn't take such a long time to build," he smirked.

Bulma gave him a nasty look.

"And you're telling me I didn't notice this? It's kind of hard to miss something this big! And there would have been a lot of noise-"

"Oh please, you had a company to run during the day. It wasn't loud enough to hear from another building, not for you anyway," he sneered.

Bulma folded her arms and turned her back to him, eyeing the ship.

"So what do you need?" she asked.

"Food, water… the basics," he said.

Videl stepped up to him.

"Uhh, Vegeta?" 

He didn't respond and she continued undeterred.

"While you're up there," she said, emotionless, as if everything was finally taking its toll on her, "do you think you could look for Pan too?"

"Whatever," he said.

"Thanks.

--

__

Woah, Pan thought.

Through the round window of their small spacecraft she saw what Totan had been bragging about: a huge ship, at least three times the size of Capsule Corp., that resembled a model city. There was movement outside on the pads that Pan assumed were for launches and landings – those aliens could breathe in space, she realized. Several rectangular "towers" sprouted from up from the ship and dozens of windows lined the outer hull. If she looked close enough, she could see shapes moving through the windows.

"Having any doubts?" Totan asked.

"No," she said, shaking her head.

Really though, she _was_ having second thoughts about this decision and had been since they left that bar (if it could be called that) on Travlaka. She was incredibly nervous – so much so that she had stuffed her hands into her pockets to keep them from shaking. If she didn't like this then she had no where to go. They would never be able to find Dumu and she didn't dare consider going back to Earth. What if there wasn't a job for her? Totan said that there were others scouting for new recruits so all of the openings could have already been filled.

Their ship docked on one of the flat platforms; another alien came aboard to maneuver it into the hangar. Totan asked if Lord Rhoune had returned yet and the man – or whatever it was – said no.

"Are you hungry? Need to use the waste facilities?"

"Waste facilities?" Pan repeated. She didn't have anything to throw away.

"You know, before you spill your bladder," he said.

"Oh. Uhh, no."

"Then I'll take you to your quarters to rest. Follow me," he said, waving his tail. 

Inside, the ship seemed even bigger; the halls, covered with green carpet, were wide and branched off into countless other corridors and rooms. It was chilly too.

"Lord Rhoune should be returning shortly. You'll like her," Totan said, looking over his shoulder to smile at her.

Her? That surprised Pan a bit.

"Someone will come to get you," he continued, "but it won't be me. I have other duties to attend to."

"Oh, what else do you do?" she asked, for the sake of polite conversation.

"A little of everything, really."

They stopped at one of the gray doors (oddly, it didn't reflect the light) along the corridor and Totan flipped up the panel in the center of it. He explained that it was voice and password activated. Pan stared at it, trying to think of a password. Finally, she bent down and said her word: "Saiyajin". The door slid open for her and she looked to Totan, whose mouth was hanging open. He shut it, ushered her into the room, knocked on the wall to turn on the light and left.

The door closed when Pan had walked far enough into the room. There was a mattress shoved against the far wall: no sheets, no pillow, not even a headboard. She dragged it out of the corner and collapsed onto it, wondering if Totan knew about the Saiyajin race, trying to imagine what Rhoune looked like and then she wondered how much her mother hated her for getting Papa killed.

--

Piccolo had been transferred into a cell on a new, much more impressive ship. Not only did this new cell still bounce back ki beams, but he could no longer feel anyone onboard.

He was trapped in complete darkness and, frustrated, he punched the wall… and it hurt. Then he realized how weak he felt; it made him weary. He blamed it on the thick air and lack of proper meditation.

The door clicked and was roughly thrown open. Shoruum stormed in, grabbed him by his gi collar and smacked something against his neck before his normally fast reflexes could stop him. The thing automatically snapped shut. Piccolo's hands went to the collar, smooth and warm, and couldn't pull it off. The gorilla-like being grinned meanly. Piccolo began to power up, intending to shatter the item. And he couldn't. His eyes went wide. He couldn't feel his ki! He delved frantically to the place where he had always – since the day of his birth – been able to find his ki, and it wasn't there.

"What did you do?" Piccolo demanded.

"Blocked your ki," Shoruum rumbled. "You had a pathetic power level anyway."

__

You have no idea, Piccolo thought. His hands went back to the collar and he tried to find the line where it clasped, but there seemed to be none. He tried digging his nails into it – several of them broke at the tips.

"You _unuck_, it's a Block. The only fuck who can take it off is the one that put it on. Now come on," he said and dragged him out of the cell.

Piccolo walked ahead of him, constantly pushed from behind and told to move faster. Without his ki he couldn't escape. He expanded his senses to see if he could still feel anything, but it took ki to be able to feel it. Surprisingly, he found that he could sense Shoruum behind him, however faintly. That bothered him. What else couldn't he do without ki?

__

A lot, he realized.

They walked for about ten minutes, from the end of the ship (assuming that the cellblock was at the end) to the front where they came to a pair of handleless doors, each with identical designs etched into them: lines that curved like waves in a storm. Shoruum held Piccolo's arm by the crook as he bent down to what looked like an intercom and rumbled that he had brought the prisoner. The doors slid open and they walked in. The doors smacked shut behind them. 

Shoruum shoved him forward into the center of the large, unadorned room. Piccolo noticed an open doorway that led into another room; there was Saiyajin armor was tucked into a corner with a scouter and a pair of gloves next to it.

A large blue-gray throne, a simple yet imposing object, had its back to him. It swiveled around leisurely, moving with a black boot pushing along the ground. A greenish-yellow being finally paused in front of him, its pink hair twisted and piled atop the head, a tattoo on its left check and a silver circlet around its wrist. Its swirled, inhuman green eyes bore into him. Piccolo glared at the figure who he perceived to be Lord Rhoune, showing off the slightest hints of his fangs. She stood: small, flat chested and masculine. Her green cape dragged on the floor.

"Excuse yourself, Shoruum," she said.

He looked as if he wanted to say something, but changed his mind. He bowed and left.

"Would you like to sit down?"

She gestured toward her throne and he refused.

"Very well," Rhoune said, "I understand you're from Namek."

Piccolo knew the answer that she expected and thought he almost could have grinned.

"No."

Rhoune stared at him, seemingly not surprised.

"Then where are you from?" she asked.

"A planet," he answered. For some reason he didn't want to tell her.

She sighed. Piccolo felt her ki and, though it seemed distant, he could read it. How could someone so weak command an empire?

"Forgive me for not introducing myself. I am Lord Rhoune," she dipped her head slightly in greeting.

"Piccolo."

"Are you familiar with Lord Frieza?" she inquired. She wasn't polite, but she was proper.

Piccolo crossed his arms and growled, "Never heard of him."

"Then you really aren't any use to me. Not for information, anyway, " she rubbed at the circlet around her wrist, "but you look like you'd be good for a battle. Are you strong?"

He grinned. _Stronger than you,_ he thought, but held back the comment.

"No, nevermind. I've been meaning to test out this Block you're wearing."

Rhoune approached him. He could have crushed her – if he didn't have this damned collar on. She lifted a hand to touch the collar, smiling unkindly. He pulled away from her, her fingertips brushing his skin instead.

"Feisty," she said. "Now, I'm sure you know what this device does, but I've been wondering about something. I think that these Blocks could be used to kill, but we've only had this technology for a couple of months and I haven't had a chance to test my theory yet. See, I believe that it can bring one's power level down to nothing. Power and life force – sucked away."

And she wanted to test her theory on him, Piccolo deduced.

Rhoune again began rubbing at her wrist, saying that it was bothersome and so undid her bracelet. A flood of sudden power made his eyes widen just slightly; she kept a Block on herself. She went back to her chair, lifted the armrest and said:

"Shoruum, I'm sending the prisoner out. Take him back to his cell." She looked up at Piccolo and said, "Well? Go."

Piccolo leered at her and then turned to the door. 

"Hmph. Silly Namek," a voice rasped – it wasn't Rhoune. 

  
He whirled around. Rhoune had disappeared from her chair and there was instead something standing in front of it. He didn't recognize the form, but instinctively he knew who it was. The gleaming, purple head, the black horns and that smile… It was Frieza. Piccolo fell into an attack stance. Then he realized his mistake – he said that he had never heard of Frieza before. Then his small, first form figure transformed into Rhoune. Piccolo gawked.

"You know something, Piccolo," she accused, "and that is why I keep you alive. We will talk again another time. Perhaps even make a deal. But now you need to go, Shoruum is waiting outside."

Piccolo made for the door, which slid open for him. He was immediately grabbed him by the arm and jerked away, glaring down at the floor in thought. What _was_ she? And, more importantly, how would he stay alive? Tell her what she wanted to know… whatever that was. The idea was unappealing. Just the thought made him feel like he was betraying something. He just didn't know what.

* * *

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A/N – Now there's a nice twist for ya – Rhoune's a shapeshifter! :P Remember folks, review, **review**, review. Otherwise I get discourage. L 

And thanks again to Steve for beta'ing this chapter for me!

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Planned Update – 5/20


	4. Prove Yourself Saiyajin Style

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Title: Another Life: Return of the Fallen

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Chapter Four: Prove Yourself - Saiyajin Style

* * *

A brown square-headed alien who introduced himself as Bénán came to retrieve her. He led her down a rounded corridor with many windows showing her a very dull, black sight. Pan saw a bright dot in the vast darkness, but it didn't twinkle. 

They stopped at two enormous doors – more wide than they were tall – and Bénán bent down at the black box and said that he had brought Kaka.

"How do you know my name?" she asked.

"Lord Rhoune told me. Now get in there," he said and left.

"Oh, Bénán!" Rhoune called. 

He reappeared in the doorway.

"Come in here," she said, "you forgot to bow."

He shuffled in and it seemed to Pan that his features were strained in order to keep them neutral. He placed a fist over his chest, knelt and bent so low that his square forehead touched the floor. Then suddenly Bénán was sailing through the open doors and crashing into the far wall. Pan stared wildly at Rhoune, whose bracelet was only just now clattering on the floor, then looked back to Bénán, whose head had been entirely disintegrated. The doors slid shut and Rhoune picked up her bracelet and rehooked it.

"Please forgive me, Kaka, but that is what happens to the men that displease me. Bénán lied. The poor fool," she said, sitting back down on her throne.

Pan nodded, quashing the nauseous feeling in her gut. She wanted to ask how she knew her name, but then figured that Totan must have told her. So instead she asked:

"What is this place?"

"This ship? Think of it as a moving army base, equipped with weapons and soldiers, pilots and scientists… things along that line. Our business is planet trade. A planet full of untouched or accessible elements is worth a good lot from the buyers," she explained.

"How do you get the planets?" Pan asked.

"Most of the planets in this quadrant are uninhabited, or at least don't have any intelligent life on them anymore. But we have started to move out of this quadrant, expanding our territory, I suppose. The buyers are very fickle sometimes, wanting the planets to be habitable along with having so many good resources available. They should be lucky I let them live in my quadrant," Rhoune said, her voice suddenly bitter.

"Your quadrant?"

"Yes," she smiled, "this is my quadrant. There is more than this ship; and there is more than the tiny army that I have aboard this ship. I command an empire, my dear. Originally commanded by a family known as Kold. The Kold that had charge of this quadrant was an Ice-jin known as Freeza."

Pan went stiff and her breath caught in her throat. She kept her face from betraying her surprise, but her eyes had gone wide and she knew it, she just hoped Rhoune didn't notice. Years ago she had heard the story of Freeza from her father, but she had been too young to really remember any specific details. Pan remembered that he wasn't human, that he was an evil tyrant who had wanted to rule the universe and had tried to kill Grandpa Gokuu. 

Oh, what had she gotten herself into? Maybe there was a chance for her to still leave, but again she asked herself: _where is there to go?_ And the answer was still the same: _nowhere_.

"Totan tells me that you're rather powerful," Rhoune said, taking the subject away from Freeza, "and if that's true then I could use someone like you. If you know how to fight, that is."

"I do," Pan said quickly.

"Do you? Then perhaps you would be willing to give me a demonstration later. I will have some of my men prepare the training quarters. And while that is being done you can get a new attire, you've been wearing those much too long," Rhoune said, almost mockingly.

"How would you know?" Pan snapped and regretted her attitude immediately. It occurred to her then that she must smell awful because she had been wearing her outfit for what had to be weeks now. 

"The blood on your pants. It's brown and dry," Rhoune explained simply.

"Oh."

Rhoune pulled up the armrest of her chair and spoke into the intercom, originally ordering for the cybamen to be prepared, but then canceled that and said to have the whiteskins be made ready. She also had someone – another squat, brown alien – come up to escort Pan through the ship. 

"Find her some dress and armor. We're going to see how good you are, Kaka."

Somehow this thing – woman – was connected to Freeza, which, in Pan's mind, made her just as evil.

--

Pan tried to make a mental map of the corridors as she was led down them, but after several turns she gave up. It was still too new and her mind was still too jumbled. The rotund creature in front of her waddled along, leading her down a conveyor belt to a thick steel door. He smacked it, hard.

"Lord Rhoune demands a training session for the new recruit!"

Moments later the door squeaked and parted for them. They walked into the room: a reflective black material covered an entire wall and the rest was made of some foreign, black-grayish metal. There was another door and the brown creature opened it for her, saying she would find a couple spare suits in there that she could wear. Pan looked and indeed there were some navy blue jumpsuits hanging on a bar extended across the room. She snatched down one of them and looked back to the alien, who was still standing in the door.

"Do you mind?" she asked, irritated.

"Mind what?" he asked.

"Closing the door so I can get changed?" Pan snapped.

"Oh," he said, eyeing her oddly, "of course not."

The door closed with a hiss and a click. She took off her shirt and put it to her nose; it reeked of sweat and a scent that told her she had been wearing it far too long. Pan peeled off her jeans, which had been plastered onto her legs – refused to take off her undergarments - then picked up the jumpsuit. There was no zipper in the back, no button in the front; so just how was she supposed to put it on? Then she noticed that it was really a two-piece outfit and pulled the top from the pants. She dressed, put her sneakers back on and fitted an armor plating over her head, which was very uncomfortable.

When she came out, there were four… things in the room. White, hairless things with black eyes much too large for their faces, two long teeth that hung from the tops their mouths and claws that could have used some clipping. Pan made a face at one of them; it was drooling. The cy-whatevers probably wouldn't have looked any better.

The animals – if they could be called that – fell onto all fours and rushed at her together, snarling and frothing. Pan pulled her lips long in annoyance, put up her fists and waited for them.

--

Behind the black mirror, Lord Rhoune watched intently. Her swirled, inhuman eyes followed Pan's fluent motions; she lacked grace, but she had obvious skill. Pan kicked away one of the whiteskins with just one quick motion, sending it flying into the far wall. The animal stuck for a minute and then fell, a large dent in the metal from where it had impacted – that had never happened before. One of the slobbering animals had leapt onto her, claws embedded deep into her thighs. A dark stain was seeping out and into her suit. But the whiteskin was ripped from her leg, ripping several long gashes in the suit and in her skin; Pan threw it up in the air and blew a hole straight through its stomach.

Rhoune smiled. That was what she wanted to see. Ruthlessness. Aggression. She was impressed that Kaka had been so willing to kill it after it had harmed her, which meant that it wouldn't be too difficult to turn her into a mass murderer. Rhoune didn't even need to watch the rest of the session, she knew that Kaka would be perfect for the job, but she stayed anyway. Another whiteskin went careening into the wall; the other into the black two-way mirror, long cracks appearing in it. She marched into the training room, green cape sweeping behind her.

"Splendid work, my pet! You will make a nice addition to my crew," Rhoune said, then added: "You can take another suit from the room there, unless you like the tears in it now."

"I just don't like this armor. It's annoying," Pan said, trying to readjust the aforementioned item.

"Oh? You're the first being to ever complain about it."

"It pushes down on my chest. I don't think this thing was designed for women," she said.

"Hmm. Then it can modified, if you'd like," Rhoune offered.

"No, no," Pan said, wrestling to get the armor up and over her head. She finally got it off and dropped it on the ground, saying, "I'll just go without." 

"Very well then. Dés will take you to get a meal, then back to your quarters." 

Pan nodded, figuring the brown alien was Dés and said, "Okay."

Rhoune went to leave, but then turned back around.

"If you don't mind my saying, you look very Saiyajin… especially in that attire. All that you're missing is a monkey tail."

"I _am_ Saiyajin. A full-blooded Saiyajin," she lied. "My tail was cut off in a fight."

Rhoune grinned and nodded once. "The Saiyajin are an extinct race. Their planet was destroyed many years ago, but you look much too young to know anything about that. Where are you from again?" she asked.

She spat the name with loathing: "Earth".

"I'm curious about your story, but I have other business to attend to and you must be tired after such a long journey and so little sleep. Please, eat and rest. Then we will talk again and you will tell me about 'Earth'," Rhoune said and left through the heavy doors.

Pan stared after her, even when she could no longer see her, with her brows drawn down in bewilderment.

--

The door of his cell opened, sliding back into the wall and Piccolo already recognized the silhouette by the hair that was piled atop the head. It seemed like he had spent hours in darkness concentrating on the sliver of light at the bottom of the door and Rhoune had still come too soon. He needed more time to ponder over her words, over what she could possibly want and how he was going to kill Pan when he found her.

"Hello, Piccolo," she greeted.

"What do you want?" he growled.

"Watch your manners, Namek. I can kill you, or starve you, or just torture you… depends on how angry you want to make me." 

Piccolo decided that he wouldn't tell her that he didn't eat. 

He had an idea as to what she wanted to know and if she killed him she would learn nothing. The idea of dying again was unflattering; Gokuu had given his life to get him out of Hell. Now, if he died again then not only would he return to that wretched place, but it would feel as if he had wasted the life that Gokuu had given to him. He remained silent and waited for Rhoune to go on.

"What do you know about the Lord Freeza?" she asked.

He looked up at her from his seat on the floor.

"That he was an evil tyrant who wanted to rule the universe," he said, then on a hunch he continued, "and used whoever he needed to get what he wanted."

Rhoune's eyes narrowed. What was the connection to Freeza? 

"What do _you_ know about him?" Piccolo asked.

"This interrogation does not work both ways. I ask you questions, you answer, and that is all," Rhoune said crisply. "Now, what happened on your planet?"

"I told you before, I wasn't born on Namek and I didn't live there either," he said.

"Namek, if you don't tell me what happened on your planet before it exploded, you are going to spend a _very_ long time writhing on the floor, begging me to kill you."

Piccolo raised his brows in challenge. He wasn't going to beg to go back to Hell. But what could he tell her? He was telling her the truth – he was just leaving out a few details.

"I didn't live there," he enunciated slowly, "so how would I know?"

Rhoune's Block bracelet fell to the ground and her hand went around his throat – her fingers didn't have any nails. She formed a small, bright ball of ki in her other hand and held it in front of his face. Without the ability to protect himself with his ki, he would be in serious trouble if she wanted to fire that at him.

"Tell me the truth. _Now_," she demanded.

He didn't respond. He had repeated himself enough.

She shoved her hand into his face, the sphere of ki exploding against his cheek and his closed eyelid. Piccolo cried out, his hands immediately going to the side of his face. He cupped his hands over the wound, not daring to touch the raw, scalded flesh that he knew was there. Another small ki blast burst against his neck, then two on his ribs, two more on his back and then onto his thigh. Piccolo clenched his fangs and groaned loudly.

"Perhaps when I visit you again you will be more eager to talk," Rhoune spat.

The door closed, leaving Piccolo alone in the blackness once again. He cupped one hand over his face and another at his side; there was nothing he could do to ease the pain. Despite being unprotected against even the tiniest attacks, he knew it could have been worse. The pain was bearable and his regeneration capabilities would have him healed in a couple days. Until then he would have to bear it, but he was far from writhing in agony.

--

There was a beeping warning coming from the controls and a minute later there were several small objects smacking against Vegeta's ship and ricocheting off. It wasn't an asteroid or any tiny rocks, it was pieces of metal that were leaving faint dents in the hull as they hit. Then something else smacked against the ship that wasn't metal and, somehow, he automatically knew the sound – it was a body. It slipped off and passed by one of the windows: an alien body with Saiyajin armor. If there had been anything left he would have gone out to investigate, but their ship had been completely obliterated.

A tiny voice was gnawing at the back of his head, telling him he knew what was going on. Other than Saiyajins, the only people who had ever received their armor were the ones who had worked under Freeza. This had something to do with Freeza. But there had been no one left to take charge, so why were they still pirating and capturing ships? _Idiots. Probably just didn't want to lose the muscle they had._ And they got blown up for it.

His ship plowed through the debris. It would be another two days before he reached the spot where Piccolo had been captured. What would have taken Piccolo three days to travel in his ship took Vegeta only one. 

Still, after so many years – over a decade – whatever had been left of Freeza's empire should have fallen. Yet there was obviously something left of it. 

Vegeta would enjoy destroying it.

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Author's Note – I hope a few things have been explained, but there is still much to come. ;) I don't have a lot of free time on my hands, but I do try to keep up. And remember: review, **review**, review!

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Thank You's **To** – My beta-reader, Steve, as always. ^_^ Also, my reviewers: Dreamwraith and Chaotic-Souls (and by the by, you are right… they _would_ have jumped for joy ;) I know what happened, and I plan on working it into the story later on)

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Planned Update – 6/3


	5. Mission

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Title – Another Life: Return of the Fallen

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Chapter Five – Mission

* * *

With food in her stomach – whatever it was she had eaten – Dés escorted Pan back to her quarters. It turned black inside after the door closed so she smacked the wall as she had seen Totan do earlier and the dim light came to life. She flopped down on the mattress, which slid it a couple inches across the floor. 

Dés had taken her to get her scratches cleaned, but she wouldn't have them bandaged; she was proud of her scars. He stayed with her while she ate and, although he was boring, he knew how things worked. If she agreed to work for Lord Rhoune she could expect the usual beginning wage – five pieces of iron. That hadn't seemed like much to Pan, but after it was explained to her, she understood that most of the metals she was accustomed to on Earth (and the foreign ones from alien planets that she had never heard of) were valuable here. Anyone who dealt in intergalactic trade needed money that everyone had, and that was it. 

Rhoune already seemed to think that she had agreed to work for her, but it wasn't official yet. Pan didn't even know what kind of work she would do. She fell asleep trying to figure out what kind of job she would have.

There was a kick at the door when she opened her eyes, then another, then a voice shouting, "Kaka!"

It took her a moment to recognize the voice. It was Totan. She rolled off the mattress and stood up. 

"What?" 

"May I come in?" he asked.

"Yeah, sure," she said.

Pan bent down toward the black intercom box, said her password and stepped back as the door slid open. Totan's long tail was stretched on the floor behind him and he was making a "come here" gesture with his hand.

"What?"

"Come, you get to go on your first assignment. I will tell you about it on the way to the pads," he said.

How could she be sent out on an assignment when she hadn't even agreed to work for this pink-haired bitch? Well, she hadn't agreed verbally, at least. And it was so soon too. Still, she followed Totan down the hall as he spoke. They were going to Corinthin, one of the moons of a planet that she didn't catch the name of. If they destroyed this planet, which was a gas giant that discharged chunks of space rock that was damaging their moon, then the Corinthins would give them the other three moons and a generous sum of aluminum.

"I'm no rocket scientist, but if we blow up the planet, won't it throw off their moons orbit?" Pan asked.

"It will be their problem if it does."

She shrugged as they trudged up the ramp that led into the hangar, thinking that she didn't really care either – she didn't have any reason to. Two other aliens met them in the dimly lit room, which was lined with rows of spherical space pods, several mini-crafts and many busy bodies. One of the aliens was a mammoth, purple being; the other was rather human-looking, but the golden horn protruding from the center of his forehead said otherwise. There were four white pods being rolled out onto the launch pads.

"Do you know what those are?" Totan asked.

Pan shook her head.

"Saiyajin space pods. I thought you were Saiyajin," he said, smiling, and cocked his head slightly to the side.

"I am. It's just… I've lived on another planet and haven't been able to see stuff like this," she said lamely.

"_Venirre come/come on_, I want t'be back by _meîla'ann meal time_," the man with the golden horn said.

"No worry, you get your dumbmeal," the purple behemoth growled.

__

Oh great, Pan thought. The pretty boy kept lapsing into whatever other language it was he knew, and the other one could hardly speak understandably. She hoped she didn't have to work too closely with them.

--

The cell was so small that if he were to lie down he had to bend his knees in order to fit on the floor. Piccolo pressed his hands against the smooth wall, as hard as he could, and tried moving it down. His hand skidded down with an annoying _eek eek shweek _sound. He slid his shoes across the floor; they had no grip. He pulled them off and tried moving his foot, slightly dampened, in the same manner – it didn't move so easily. Piccolo braced both hands on the wall and lifted a leg to reach to the opposite wall, stretching it as much as he needed until he had it stuck, then put his other foot up as well. The small burns on his flesh protested painfully, but he worked his way further up the wall, first moving a hand up, then the other, then his feet. He stopped when his fingertips brushed the ceiling and looked down at the dark floor below.

It was both tiring and agonizing to keep himself stretched out at the ceiling, but he had to do it. Rhoune had mentioned starving him, which meant that prisoners must be fed some time. He didn't know when they were fed: daily? Weekly? Piccolo hoped she hadn't actually intended to starve him.

Some hours later - not quite a day - he could finally hear a shuffling of feet outside the cell. The movement stopped, the door clicked and then slid open.

"Food ti-" the voice stopped mid-sentence when they saw the empty room.

Piccolo dropped from the ceiling, kicking the tray up into the alien's face. He swiftly moved behind it – it looked female enough - wrapped his arms around her neck and purposefully dug his wrist into her jugular. The alien thrashed helplessly, lacking the strength needed to even get away from a ki-stripped Namek. After several minutes she went dead weight in his arms and he dragged her further into the cell, slumping her on the back wall. Piccolo looked through her outfit for something like a key that would get the Block off of his neck, but the gorilla hadn't been lying; the only one who could take it off was the one who had put it on. He swept out of the room and examined the door, trying to figure out how to close it, but eventually gave up and moved quickly down the hall.

He kept close to the wall and peeked around the corner, finding a pair of aliens in Saiyajin outfits some distance away. Looking down at his own attire, Piccolo realized that he didn't exactly blend in. So he headed back the cell, stripped the alien of her attire, ditched his own clothing and put on the deep blue suit that surprisingly contoured to fit his body. It was sweaty and unpleasant against his skin and he shot a disgusted look at the unconscious body.

As he slipped back out into the sparsely lit hall, Piccolo reached up to the Block and half-heartedly tried to fit his fingers underneath it – they wouldn't fit and he couldn't pull it off anyway. He pulled up the collar of the suit to hide the Block and strode back down the hall. The two aliens he had seen before had moved on. He continued, forcing himself to keep a normal pace and try to act as if he was part of the crew. Around the corner someone bumped into him, a small brown thing, and he moved around it before it could get a good look at him.

"Watch it, shitpile," the stout alien hissed.

Piccolo ignored it and moved on, glancing at doors and open archways, trying to discern if any of them were a possible exit.

"Hey, you, wait a moment."

He pretended it wasn't talking to him.

"Hey, green," the brown alien called again.

He pretended his skin wasn't green.

"Shitpile!"

He didn't have to pretend that he wasn't a pile of rancid waste. The alien grabbed his wrist, much to Piccolo's dislike. He turned and jerked his hand away, glaring at the smaller being. It formed a glowing ball of ki in its four-fingered hand.

"You were brought in as a _prisoner_."

"You must be mistaken," Piccolo said calmly, even though he knew he was caught.

"You tried to walk away," it said.

"I was in a hurry," he replied casually. 

Then an idea sprung to mind. _This isn't the man I saw brought in, _he projected the thought into the alien's head, hoping that he might mistake it for his own inner voice. _Look at his outfit._ Piccolo wondered how fast he could run if this didn't work.

"Where were you going?" the alien asked skeptically.

Piccolo's tongue was swift with the answer, though he wished now he knew more about machinery and all of its quirky, technological names. "Spaceships. I've got… work to do." He thought about the kind of work Vegeta had done.

He forced another thought into the alien's mind, _Let him go._

"Get away then, I know Master Rhoune does not like waiting for things to be done."

Piccolo moved by him swiftly and down the corridor. He only had to convince a shipful of galactic beings that he was part of the crew, not a prisoner. The hall branched off to the right, but also continued ahead. The ape had taken him right and led him to Lord Rhoune's cozy little chamber, so he decided he would keep straight. A few aliens glanced at him and a couple of them stared too long, recognition in their eyes. He looked away and acted as if they didn't exist. They didn't follow him.

A few minutes later he came across another fork in the hall: go straight, turn right or turn left. He went left, opting to stay as far away from Rhoune's quarters as he could. 

"Isn't that him?" a voice said down the hall. 

Piccolo looked over his shoulder. Another brown creature, taller and lankier, was pointing a finger in his general direction. The black gorilla, Shoruum, was standing next to it and snarling. He would have bet that the alien was one of the ones involved in capturing him.

"Yes, it _is_," Shoruum said gruffly. His knees bent and his long arms fell lower, his knuckles touching the floor and propelling him forward in small leaps.

Piccolo ran, his eyes searching for an open door. All he found was a ramp that led up and so he darted up it, his large ears picking up the sound of pattering behind him. He had found the escape route he had been looking for, but he had hoped to have been undiscovered when he got there. There were Saiyajin space pods launching outside and rows of them in the hangar. Several aliens were inside.

"Get him!" Shoruum bellowed.

They all swarmed around him, cutting off any chance of an exit. Shoruum leapt onto him and they both topples onto the ground, the gorilla's weight pinning him to the ground.

"How did you get out?" he demanded. His breath was foul.

"Good behavior," Piccolo said evenly.

Shorrum punched him in the nose and dragged him up onto his feet. A purple liquid was dripping down onto his lips that he recognized as blood. He _never_ bled so easily.

"Weakling."

"Take off the collar and see how weak I am," said Piccolo, raising his brow challengingly.

"I'm not stupid, _unuck a vulgar name_," Shoruum growled and wretched Piccolo's arms behind his back, pushing him forward roughly. "And you are going back to your damn cell. No meals."

He didn't eat anyway.

--

There was a spaceship following him that had come from the planet he had passed a short while ago. Somehow it had managed to tap into his communication system and was creating a horrendous amount of static. Then finally it cleared and there was a voice speaking to him in a foreign tongue. Vegeta eyed the intercom sourly and held down the switch to speak.

"Wrong language," he said.

"So you speak the universal tongue. What is your business in our galaxy?"

"What concern is it of yours?" Vegeta countered.

"This is a dangerous quadrant to be in. We only wished to warn you," the voice said.

"About what?" he asked.

There was more static from the system and a broken voice, which eventually fixed itself.

"I suggest you leave this galaxy while you still can."

"I'm looking for someone. I believe he might have been captured," said Vegeta. He had an idea as to what was going on, and just where he was. "Do you know where he might have been taken?"

"Perhaps, perhaps not. If you were _intelligent_ you would leave."

There was more static and he waited for it to disappear.

Vegeta smirked darkly. "Tell me what you know and I might not kill you."

A long silence ensued and crisp static began to constantly come and go.

"Come wi… us. If… want informa…n… might cost y… something."

They wanted to swindle him, he realized. Their planet was more towards the outskirts of the Frieza's claimed territory and if he had left it alone there probably wasn't much to make a profit off of. These idiots had to get money some way, but it wouldn't be from him. He could blow up their planet with his pointer finger if they gave him reason to.

"Very well," Vegeta sneered, not intending to pay them anything. "How much?"

"A battle. Defeat… champion and we will tell y… what… want to know." 

__

Too easy, Vegeta thought. He grabbed the controls and turned the ship in a slow one-eighty and followed the other vessel back to the purple and blue planet. He couldn't believe the trouble he was going through just to find that blasted Namek.

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Author's Note – I apologize for the shortness of this chapter. It couldn't really be helped. ^_^;; And I also apologize for the lateness… I got sidetracked writing an X-Men fic, playing around with an X-Men Evolution idea, and finally began a Chaozu/Tien fic that I've been meaning to write forever. *sighs* But fret not, I shall continue with this. *grins*

Remember to **review**! They make me happy.

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Thank You's To – My beta-reader, Steve. And my lovely reviewers: Cyndi (I love you, in a non-sexual, non-lesbianish way. Hope the Piccolo-ness of this chapter made you happy), Xzanayu and Dreamwraith. *scratches head* Gee, not quite the amount of reviews I was hoping for… ah well. I love you all anyways! And thankies bunches!

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Planned Update – Rough estimate? 6/18, my birthday!


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